


First name basis

by i_gaze_at_scully



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-03
Updated: 2018-07-03
Packaged: 2019-10-09 04:57:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17400452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_gaze_at_scully/pseuds/i_gaze_at_scully
Summary: A peek into the use and importance of Mulder and Scully's first names.





	First name basis

The first time he calls out her first name in bed it takes her aback. Her surprise must show on her face, and when he slows, his features transform into concern, embarrassment.

“I’m sorry, is that, was that okay?” He stutters, still inside her, gently brushing her tousled hair behind her ears.

She shifts her hips up, grinds into him, places both hands on his chest. “Say it again,” she urges, pulling him in by the back of his neck to kiss him.

“Dana,” he mumbles into her mouth, thrusting slowly and carefully, gradually picking up his pace. She revels in the sound, lets it heighten every sensation.  “I want to see you, I want to see you come,” he breathes, reaching a hand between them to find her clit. She moans as she builds and builds. Panting hard and thrusting harder, he presses his thumb against her and growls “Come for me, Dana.” And she does.

—

His first name feels clumsy on her tongue, so she tries it out in the mirror a few times. She watches the shape of her lips, downturned and not quite a proper O, as she pronounces the vowel. The single syllable can be a breath, let go like a sigh, or a double-edged sword, hard consonants on either end. She practices both.

“Something fun going on in there, Scully?” He asks one day from the doorframe, startling her.

“Jesus, Mulder, you scared the shit out of me.” He comes up behind her and loosens her grip on the edge of the sink, wraps both their arms around her waist.

“Whatcha doing in here?” He kisses her hairline behind her ear, nuzzles his nose under her earlobe. “I heard my name. A lot.”

They make eye contact in the mirror and she flushes. “I just, the other day… I felt like I should maybe–” He smiles at her and spins her in his arms.

“Scully, don’t feel like you have to change a thing,” he assures. “It’s still us, it’s still me. Whatever makes you comfortable–I just want you to be happy. You could call me anything at all and I’d still consider myself the luckiest man in the world,” he says, kissing her forehead tenderly.

“Anything?” She challenges, relaxing in his arms.

“Anything,” he says resolutely, not a hint of skepticism in his eyes.

“All right then, poopyhead. Whatever you say.” She kisses him and smacks his ass lightly, smirking as she disentangles herself and reaches for the bathroom door. He follows her out, ignoring her shrieks and empty protests as he scoops her up and throws her over his shoulder. He lays her down on the bed with a smile and kisses her till giggles turn to moans and pet names turn to profanities.

—

She never thought this day would come. At least not for a while, not so young. Losing a parent is, she knows, one of the hardest things in the world. Losing a parent to suicide, she can only imagine, is infinitely worse. When she holds him in his apartment, she pushes the image of Teena Mulder’s Y-incision from her mind. She doesn’t think about her sharp sigh when she definitively concluded the cause of death, how she dreaded having to bring Mulder the news. All she knows in that moment is that the person that means the world to her is hurting in ways she cannot know, and all thought becomes irrelevant. She holds him, kisses his neck, soothes him as best she can while he sobs. She sheds silent tears that dissipate in his hair when she presses her cheek to his head. He mumbles her first name over and over, “Dana, Dana.” Softer and softer until it’s almost imperceptible.

She decides that hearing his first name, the name his mother gave him, the name she called him all his life, would do more harm than good at this moment. So when his breathing steadies and she helps him up off the floor, she takes his face in her hands, thumbs away his tears. “I’m here, Mulder,” she promises him. “I’m right here.”

—

His complicity in the abandoned office only deepens the trench of her guilt. It was all for nothing. Lying to him, even by omission, had been torture. She kept telling herself it would be worth it, he would understand, he would have done the same. He  _has_  done the same, she thought.

He speaks to her in a monotone, his eyes glazed over, even when he approaches the question of her survival.  _I swear what he told me was true._  She feels the rage building inside her, the knowledge that she was duped, used to serve  _cancer man’s_  needs again, after all she’d lost already. Mulder nods without feeling.

He returns home with her, unquestioningly, without permission or discussion. She isn’t sure she wants him there now, but she’s sure he won’t leave her side for a while, so she makes no protest. Once inside, his silence grates on her ears like nails on a chalkboard and she can’t take it.

“Dammit Mulder, say something,” she demands, her fist slammed down on the kitchen counter. At the same time that she wants to shake him, slap him, snap him out of it, she feels compelled to fall to her knees and beg forgiveness. Confess her trespasses and absolve herself in his eyes somehow. His disapproval radiates off him in droves and it drives her mad. He squares his shoulders and meets her gaze, eyes hard.

“You could have died. You trusted him with your life, gambled it in his game, and didn’t  _tell_ me–”

“I told you I couldn’t tell you, you know he would have found out, you know I wanted to.” She steps out of the kitchen, tries to occupy more space than the inch he’d given her by the counter.

“And so what that you wanted to? What good what that have done me if you’d died? If you didn’t tell me in the beginning, there was no way–”

“I tried to send you the tapes, I tried–”

“He  _drugged_  you, you think he didn’t know your every move? Got right inside your head to use you, he always does, he always–”

“I didn’t know what else to do, Fox!” She shouts, and the room goes quiet. Angry tears stream down her face and suddenly the space between them, inches and feet, is miles and more. He breaks eye contact first, his head hung low. He lets out a slow sigh and she takes the moment to wipe the tears off her face.

He crosses to her wordlessly and wraps his arms around her tentatively at first, then tighter, desperately. She lets herself lean into the embrace, realizing that she’s just as desperate for it.

“You are the most important thing in my life, Dana. I can’t lose you. Please.” He takes a shaky breath and brings a hand to the back of her head, smoothing down her hair and pressing her into his chest. He whispers once more into her hairline. “Please.”

—

They spend the last few months before his abduction like teenagers in love. They makeout in the car on long road trips around Smallsville, USA. They draw ketchup smileys on the other’s plate in run down diners while weary waitresses smile to themselves behind the counter. She falls asleep on his couch and he wraps an Afghan around her. When she wakes up, he’s right there beside her, snoring softly with his head lolled on the couch back. She kisses him awake and they make love on the couch, on the floor, on his bed, in the shower. They travel to Hollywood and stroll around in the California haze, hand in hand.

“We have the Bureau credit card and you want to go to an In-N-Out, Mulder? Really?”

“I love that headband, you know,” he says, snaking his arm around her waist, deftly and effectively evading her question. She’s enveloped in him and he smells like heaven. She’d eat gas station sushi if it would make him happy. But as fate would have it, the In-N-Out is closed, much to Mulder’s dismay, and Scully supplies an alternative. She pulls him into the alleyway behind the chain and kisses him against the wall.

“I have something for you,” she purrs with her fingers wrapped in his hair. “A surprise.”

He pulls her in as tightly as he can and she feels the full length of him against her abdomen. “I always love your surprises,” he mutters.

“You’re going to take me back to the hotel.” She nips at an earlobe, runs it between her teeth. “You’re going to order the most expensive bottle of wine they have–”

“Two,” he interjects, gasping as she reaches down to palm his bulge.

“Two,” she agrees. “But you’re going to have them delivered later this evening, because you’re not going to be able to come to the door for a while.”

“And why’s that?”

She pulls back for a moment, hands on them hem of her dress. She lifts it slowly, watching as he struggles to keep his hands still. “Because,” she whispers with a smirk, “I’m not wearing any underwear, Fox.”

They don’t make it back to the hotel.

He’s gone less than two months after that. Full of both loss and the promise of life, she cries herself to sleep on his pillow muttering his name over and over.

“Fox,” she cries alone. “ _Fox_.”

—

He is returned, he is saved, and so is she.  _We’re doing just fine_ , she smiles, and they kiss with a simplicity reserved for those whose souls speak in secret tongues. Whose love manifests in miracles and defies men and gods alike to endure. They kiss holding their child, their son, and all is right with Fox and Dana.


End file.
